


Bleeding Out

by Snarky_Warden



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Blood and Injury, F/M, Injury, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-16
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2020-12-17 10:02:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21052559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snarky_Warden/pseuds/Snarky_Warden
Summary: Prompt Fill for October Challenge event: Blood.Nothing like a stabbing to be welcomed in to Orzammar.





	Bleeding Out

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks ever so much to [Rosehip](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosehip) for their help with the beta!

“Gah!” Kallian groaned then held her breath as Wynne’s cold fingers prodded at her belly. “Ngg… St-stop!” 

Her gaze shot to the ceiling and she concentrated on the square runic patterns in the stone so she didn’t cry out again. Her abdomen was streaked with blood, and more rivulets rolled down her skin with every laboured breath. Clenching her hands had long since turned her knuckles white. 

“Almost done, child,” Wynne soothed. 

Mercifully, heat emanated from her cold hands and turned into the relieving balm of healing magic. Kallian’s chest eased and she took a full breath without pain. She slumped back down on her bed, eyes heavy, heart racing. 

“When I said I liked seeing you covered in blood, I meant the blood of our enemies, my warden,” Zevran allowed himself a light chuckle. His hands went to her face, stroking sweaty hair from her forehead. “Better?”

“Much,” Kallian said weakly. 

“You’re shaking, amor,” Zevran said. His fingers carded through her hair again.

“It’s the blood loss. Nothing that a bit of food and drink shouldn’t sort out,” said Wynne. “Let’s get you cleaned up though first, shall we?” 

With Zev’s hand behind her back, she sat up, pleased that nothing felt like it was tearing apart inside. 

"I did say Dwarven politics could be cutthroat, did I not?”

“We’ve been here all of two days!” Kallian protested. 

Wynne pursed her lips together, having now returned with a basin of water and cloth. The water turned red with every dunk of the cloth until Kallian’s skin was clean. The only evidence of an injury was an angry red line where the knife had gone into her. Usually Wynne’s healing was impeccable, not a trace of scarring. But Kallian’s insides were firmly inside her and she wasn’t bleeding anymore so why complain. 

“It is rather alarming that someone would attack you in broad day- during the middle of the day. You are a Grey Warden, honoured guest of The Assembly.”

“And picking the wrong side in the battle for the throne, according to someone,” Zevran replied. 

Wynne tutted. “We all ought to be more careful around here. Let me get you some soup, child.”

Worry gnawed on her insides, enough to suppress her usual irritation at Wynne calling her ‘child’ at every chance she got.

“There, now eat up and you should feel your strength return soon enough.”

Her shaking hands caused the soup to slosh over the edge of the bowl and onto her lap. “Ow,” she hissed, and shooed Wynne’s hands away. “It’s fine.”

Wynne cast a concerned glance at her but Kallian continued to shoo her out of the room.

“So... you think Harrowmont’s people did this?” Kallian asked Zev. All she did was attend a single meeting. No agreements had been made. Who was watching her? 

Zevran sat on the edge of the bed, pensive. “Unless you have made other enemies in the short time we have been here. But it could be a radical. Someone who wanted to send a message that they aren’t happy the Warden is interfering in their politics. Or hoped to gain favour by taking out a political enemy.”

“Political enemy?” Kallian nearly laughed, then a sobering thought struck her. She remembered the gates. “Could someone of Loghain’s gotten in?”

“Well, was your attacker of a certain stature?”

Kallian turned red. “Ah… no, he was definitely a dwarf…”

Zevran shrugged. “That is not to say he could not employ a surface dwarf to his needs. But I highly doubt word already made it back to Denerim in time for him to change tactics.”

Absentmindedly, she wiped a hand down her front, feeling trickles of the soup broth soaking her clothes. Well, the shirt was ruined already anyway.

“Whoever it was also knew who I was meeting with, they were expecting me.”

Zevran nodded. “I too, am convinced it was not a random attack. They did not try to steal from you, and the blade was sharp enough to pierce hard leather, but hardly an instantly fatal wound. It may have been intended as a warning.”

“So… Harrowmont’s supporters…” Kallian lost her train of thought, suddenly ten times more tired. "Zev…" she trailed off, the softness of her voice did not match the alarm in her head.

Her fingertips tingled and the bowl slipped from her hand and crashed to the floor.

“Kallian!” he shouted. 

He was swift to pull up her shirt, newly soaked with fresh wet blood. The sealed wound was open again, with no signs of the healing magic that Wynne applied just minutes earlier. 

No wonder she felt so sick.

“What…” she mumbled, slumping back on the bed.

“Braska,” Zevran cursed, a hand over the wound to try and stem the renewed bleeding, looking toward the door. “Wynne!” 

“This is no natural wound,” Zevran muttered. “It should not behave this way, though. Magic should have been enough… Different formula.”

Every sluggish beat of her heart saw more blood pouring from the wound that refused to heal. It was so hot, warm and she was so cold. Shaking, shivering.

“What? What’s wrong?” Wynne was back in an instant. She took one look in Kallian’s direction and her face paled. “But… how?”

Relief again as Wynne poured more energy into healing her, but her head was pounding and breath faint.

“Poison,” said Zevran. “Kallian, mi amor, stay with me, okay? I can fix this.”

Her shirt was sticky. What a pity the soft sheets would be ruined. “Sorry…” she trailed off, hand twitching towards Zev across the bed. Silky soft and cool on her skin, she should pay to replace them...

When his hands pulled away and they were slicked red. “Keep by her. You will have to keep the wound sealed. I know a recipe for an antidote… but, it even resists magical healing methods. If I knew what the components were…” Zevran thought out loud, pacing with a crease in his brows. “There must be a dwarven alchemist in the city.”

“Can’t afford to lose more…”

“I will not…"

Conversation turned muddy, like she was listening from underwater. Her head was swimming and vision tunnelling.  _ Am I dying? _


End file.
